Well, you’d better do it quick: http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-thrift2-2009jan02,0,2083247.story
The law is very hard to understand. I’ve tried to read it:http://www.cpsc.gov/ABOUT/Cpsia/legislation.html but it’s not clearly written.
It is sounding an awful lot like all small businesses that produce *anything* for children will be in trouble if not sent out of business entirely. I can’t find a super clear explanation for how this law will be applied anywhere.
(Quick and dirty summary: all products that are sold intended for children must go through rigorous testing to ensure safety, they are mostly worried about lead. This means all toys/clothes/household items/whatever marketed for use by children. The cost of this could be anywhere from $150/item to $4000/item no one is sure.)
Everyone who has been contacting their representative has been ignored. This really sucks.
I am very seriously considering going on a buying spree for all handmade stuff I want to buy for the next many many years. If you like shopping for handmade stuff for kids you should consider it as well. 🙁
More info at: http://nationalbankruptcyday.com/
Yes, this appears to a very poorly written law, like most spur of the moment ‘there aught to be a law’ laws tend to be. 🙁
This part of the article threw me though…
“The law, aimed at keeping lead-filled merchandise away from children, mandates that all products sold for those age 12 and younger — including clothing — be tested for lead and phthalates, which are chemicals used to make plastics more pliable. Those that haven’t been tested will be considered hazardous, regardless of whether they actually contain lead.
“They’ll all have to go to the landfill,” said Adele Meyer, executive director of the National Assn. of Resale and Thrift Shops.”
Wait? They’re all considered to be hazardous but they go to the landfill? If they’re considered to be hazardous regardless that probably means they’re also required to dispose of the items as if they’re hazardous waste…
Yeah, they didn’t think this one through very well.
It’s really going to depend on how the law is implemented.
A few years back the electronics industry went through the same type of thing with RoHS compliance. The way that washed out was you needed to keep records that everything you put in your product fit the RoHS rules.
Transferring the electronics model into kids toys. Image that you can document that everything that went into your toys was free of lead. Then you could make a clear argument that your product is free of lead without testing it. Also if you make a whole bunch out of the same raw materials, you can test only one as a sample.
It’s a new hoop to jump through. People are going to complain for a while, find a economical way to comply and move on. I heard the same complaints in the electronics industry, yet we are still buying TVs, computers, cell phones, etc. You can still find and buy electronic kits and other products from small producers.
I like that thought, but you have to watch out. We generally thought the same thing about Sarbanes-Oxley, and it completely killed technology startup IPOs. People will find an economical way to comply, except where they can’t.
It depends a lot on how it’s enforced, and that’s simply not clear.
Except that, from what I’ve read, this one requires that the finished item go to one of a very small number of labs for testing – period.
From my (partial, so far) reading of the law, it sounds like it applies only to newly-manufactured items.
The Brief Summary page here – http://www.cpsc.gov/ABOUT/Cpsia/summaries/102brief.html – says that once they publish the testing procudeures and list of labs, then anything made 90 days after that must be certified safe by their standards.
I haven’t yet found anything mentioning resale of previously-manufactured items, or putting the financial responsibility for testing on the retailers and not the manufacturers. But then I’m only two sections into this thing…
[eta]
The only reference I’ve found yet to 10 February is that’s when the lead-content standards kick in. This page http://www.cpsc.gov/ABOUT/Cpsia/faq/101faq.html has a timetable for a lot of the bits of the law – and it specifically states that the lead-content standards apply to all products manufactured after 10 February must be certified as having no more than 600ppm of lead.
I’m still looking for anything that mentions resale of items made before that date, but haven’t yet found it.
From the article…
“Clothing and thrift trade groups say the law is flawed because it went through Congress too quickly. By deeming that any product not tested for lead content by Feb. 10 be considered hazardous waste, they contend, stores will have to tell customers that clothing they were allowed to sell Feb. 9 became banned overnight.
These groups say the law should be changed so that it applies to products made after Feb. 10, not sold after that date.
That would take action by Congress, however, because the Consumer Product Safety Commission’s general counsel has already determined that the law applies retroactively, said commission spokesman Scott Wolfson.“
There is no information in the law to that effect. And I did say that I was reading through the text of the law, not interpretations of it. I spent quite a while today reading it, and the law itself specifically refers to items manufactured after 10 February.
I never cease to be amazed by groups freaking out over a law they haven’t actually read. Its not at all unusal for there to be a big bruh hah hah in the press from some group 1/2 reading a law and freaking out, calling a reporter whose more interested in getting an article on the front page than being too specific on the details and then others who only hear about it from those articles then protesting about it.
Unfortunately it is not written in the law, but lawyers talking to the people on the committee have stated that it will be enforced retroactively, thus hurting resale.
Yeah, I read that. But there seems to be a good bit of legal precedent for fighting the retroactive stuff, since it was clearly the intent of the law to _not_ be retroactive.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bUlY6zOMPqQ&feature=channel_page
This isn’t about resale, but about current stock on hand. It’s the first of three parts.